Kawaige
by Landlady of the Universe
Summary: “Children, Gaara, are life’s greatest achievement. You must never kill a child.” Temari had told him. And maybe, just maybe, Gaara cared enough to listen.


Kawaige

by Landlady of the Universe

**Summary**: "Children, Gaara, are life's greatest achievement.  You must never kill a child."  Temari had told him.  And maybe, just maybe, Gaara cared enough to listen.

**Genre**: Random junk.  And me being evil.

**Spoilers**: Through Chunnin Exam.

**Rating**: PG-13, blood, blood, and more blood (come on, this is Gaara we're talking about)

**Disclaimer**: No own. *sniff*

**A/N**: Me loves Gaara. ^_^ I wanted to give him a chance at redemption, and, the way I figure it, the only way to do that is with the pure, unconditional love of a child.  So why Hinata?  Why not?  'Sides, they are such perfect opposites that I figured it'd be fun to stick them together.  Not sure if this is going to be a romance or not, but I'm kinda leaning towards not, so don't get your hopes up.  The title means "charm of an innocent child".

**Warning**: Character death.

_Hinata wasn't given to swearing, but at the moment, it was all she could do not to spit every curse she knew.  Her hands, her arms up to her elbows were covered in blood, but she paid no attention to it as she dug frantically through her bag._

_She could save him, dammit.  She could._

_Blood.  There was so much blood.  Too much.  Hinata snuck a glance at his face, biting her lip to keep from crying aloud and returned to her frantic task._

_She was going to save him._

_But…_

_There was too much blood.  The wound, too deep.  And somewhere inside, Hinata **knew**._

_He knew it too._

_Weak fingers clasped around her sleeve, tugging gently.  Frozen, Hinata forced herself to look down.  His hand, covered in blood, reached up to brush against her cheek.  "Love you," he forced himself to whisper.  "Always."_

_Her task forgotten, Hinata clutched him, face pressed against his mangled chest.  She could hear his watery breaths, a distant part of her noting that there was blood in his lungs.  Once, twice… They didn't trail off.  They just stopped._

_No._

_No!_

_"**Kiba**!"_

***

Hinata woke with a start, clutching her swollen stomach as her distress prompted her unborn baby into violent protest.  Gritting her teeth, she caught a quick glance at the digital clock beside her bed.  Joy.  Once again, she found herself wide-awake at three AM.

Knowing it was useless to try and go back to sleep, Hinata carefully pushed herself off the bed.  She didn't bother with the light; she could barely afford the electric bill anyway, so she was saving her electricity for more important things, like the refrigerator.  Not that there was much food in there for it to keep cool.

Beside her, Akamaru stirred, but a quick pat reassured him enough to settle back to sleep.  The dog had grown considerably since they were genin; now about the size of a full-grown male wolf, and twice as vicious when he wanted to be.  Though Kiba's family had offered to take care of the dog, Akamaru had apparently decided that he was going to take care of her.  And Hinata was thoroughly grateful for his company; she probably would have gone insane had he not been there for her.

It wasn't that her friends weren't there, but… Well, Naruto, for all his verbal support, was rather occupied with trying to draw Sasuke out of his shell.  And Sakura and Lee had a kid of their own to worry about (with another on the way as Hinata had recently been told).  Her cousin Neji, surprisingly enough, dropped by every once in a while, but his work as an Anbu kept him away.  And of course there was Shino who provided her with a rock-solid support to lean on.  But she never could quite bring herself to drop in on him in the wee hours of the morning.

And anyway, she kinda liked it when it was just she, her unborn baby and loyal Akamaru.  The dog didn't expect her to be anything but who she was.  She didn't have to try and be social, or try and think of things to say.  She didn't have to endure pity or sympathy from him.  Besides, sometimes, having Akamaru around was almost like having Kiba back again.  And these days, almost eight months since Kiba's death and only a few weeks from her due date, she missed her late husband more than ever.

Silently, Hinata padded down the dark hall way toward the kitchen.  It was always dark in the Inuzuka residence these days.  Then again, she had a feeling that it would be dark even if she plucked the sun from the sky to use as a light bulb.

Sadly enough, she was getting used to the dark.  In fact, she kinda liked it.  But, even with the lights off, the house seemed far too big, a fact accentuated by her sole occupancy.  Didn't matter, she was going to have to sell the place anyway.  Though … Kiba had loved it so.  She could practically hear his voice echoing through the hall, as it had the day they had bought it.

_It's perfect!  Lots of room for kids!  We'll have a whole pack of 'em too, Hinata…_

She fled the hallway and her memory, ducking into the kitchen and practically launching herself into a chair at the table.

Back in the bedroom, Akamaru's ears perked up at the woman's hiccupping sobs, and he glanced in her direction.  But, knowing that there was nothing he could do but let her cry herself out, the dog dropped back into his former position, mournfully watching the place where his master should have been sleeping.

The first time they had encountered one another, Temari had stopped him from killing her and her teammates.

Of course he recognized her.  Even though she was much older and her torso roughly resembled the shape of his gourd, he recognized her.  Not that her eyes weren't a dead giveaway.  What was her name…?

Not that it mattered.  Temari wasn't around this time.

His sand swirled restlessly in his gourd as he watched her.  She was afraid – he could smell it on her – and cowering.  He hated that.  Still, it wasn't like he was in a hurry or anything.  They were barely on the outskirts of Hidden Leaf, and even if anyone could sense him here, it would take some time before they recognized him as a threat.

Then again, considering that he had come here to join the village, perhaps killing one of its members was not the best way to get into the Hokage's good graces.

Though he could be quite persuasive when he wanted to be.

Shrugging to himself, Gaara figured, what the hell?  Shukaku was restless.  His sand was ready to go.  And her trembling was really beginning to tick him off.

He advanced.

"Please," she pleaded in a small voice.  "My baby.  Don't hurt my baby."

Gaara stopped.  A distant voice threaded its way through his mind.  _Children are precious, Gaara…_

He noticed the way her hands were clutched protectively over her swollen stomach.  Come to think of it, he vaguely remembered Temari beginning to mention something about pregnancy before they were interrupted.  "There's a baby in there?" he asked, gesturing toward her midsection.

Surprise flickered over her face before survival instincts kicked in and she decided to humor him.  "Yes.  If you kill me now, he'll die.  Please, you can kill me after he's born, but…"  Her expression melted into one of pure horror as she trailed off, eyes sliding downwards to look at her stomach.

While she had been speaking, a lone, curious tendril of sand had snuck forward to probe gently at her belly.  Slightly amused, Gaara probed the tendril further, flattening the end so that it was spreading over her stomach.

Without warning, she shuddered, doubling over in pain.  Startled, aqua eyes widened.  He hadn't done anything!

Retracting his sand, he forced it – with some difficulty – back into the gourd.  Then, carefully, he took a few steps forward, peering at the woman intently, who seemed to have recovered from her spell.

She glanced up, meeting his eyes and answered his question before he could ask it.  A grim smile played about her lips as she said, "The baby has decided that he wants to be born."  She hesitated, "Umm, I know this is a lot to ask.  I mean, I don't even know why you're here, but… Could you help me to the hospital?"  The last part came out in a rush, ending with another grimace of pain.

Gaara blinked in confusion.  "Will it hurt the baby if you are not at the hospital?" he asked, half out of curiosity and half in order to make his decision.

You must never hurt a baby, Gaara…

She was halfway to nodding yes, when she stopped, an unusual expression flickering across her face before she said, "It would certainly help.  And if it's all the same to you, I'd rather not give birth right here.  Don't think you'd make much of a midwife."  She hissed suddenly as another wave of pain washed over her.  "Please, Gaara-san?"

He shrugged to himself, bending over to pick her up before carefully speeding off in the direction of the hospital.

The staff of the emergency room took her almost the second Gaara set foot through the door.  Through the pain, Hinata was dimly aware that the sand shinobi had followed them into the treatment room that they had put her in.  Apparently, the nurse had mistaken him for the father.  A small smile flickered over her face before another contraction washed over her.

Her hand flailed, grabbing onto the first thing that it came into contact with and squeezing with every bit of strength she had.  Fuck it **hurt**!  It seemed that all she could feel was pain.

"Is there someone I can get for you, Hinata?"  Her obstetrician had arrived to supervise.

Hinata was having some difficulty speaking through her gritted teeth, but before she managed to say anything, a voice beside her snapped, "Naruto.  Uzumaki Naruto.  Get him."

Why was Gaara still here?

Dimly, Hinata realized that it was his hand that she was crushing.  Even so, she didn't let go.  She hurt.  Everything was happening so fast, and not at all like she had expected.  Hinata was scared, and the one person she wanted couldn't be here.

"Kiba…" she moaned, before the pain enveloped her completely and she blacked out.

For the first time in his life, Gaara got a small taste of what being on the receiving end of his Desert Graveyard must have felt like.  His hand hurt, but despite the constant pain, he didn't really want to leave.  Morbid curiosity rooted him to the spot while he watched.

Even though he had no idea what was going on, from the look on the head doctor's face, things were not going well.  It appeared that Hinata had fainted, which was generally never a good sign.

_She is weak_, Shukaku told him, watching from the back of his mind.  _You should have let me kill her earlier; she's only going to die._

For some reason, Gaara didn't want that to happen.  Babies needed mothers; wasn't he proof enough of that?  _Fix it_, Gaara told the demon.  While he didn't have control over the demon, over the years, Gaara had learned much about Shukaku from their increasingly frequent chats.  They weren't friends, not by a long shot, but they certainly understood one another rather well.  Gaara understood that Shukaku would take any chance to possess him utterly, and…

_I don't think I want to…_

_Fix it!_

…Shukaku understood that Gaara would stop feeding the demon's bloodlust if he felt the need.

_Very well_, Shukaku grumbled, though Gaara could clearly feel his amusement.  Shortly after, a cool, tickling feeling slid down his arm and through the hand that Hinata still clutched tightly; the demon's chakra.

A shrill cry suddenly rent the air as Byakugan blinked open blearily.  Before he realized what was happening, Gaara found himself holding the ugliest baby he'd ever seen.

Though, if you tilted your head and squinted a bit, it was kind of cute.

"A baby girl," the doctor told Hinata while she checked the new mother's vitals.

Hinata blinked, still fuzzy.  "A girl?"

"That's right.  Have you got a name for her yet?"

Hinata pushed herself up to get a better look at her child, still very confused.  "I thought it was a boy.  Kiba was always going on about how his first child was going to be a boy … so I guess I kinda started to believe it after a while."

"Tsukiko," Gaara surprised himself by saying, unable to take his eyes off the child he held.  Suddenly, she screamed, and the sand ninja wasted no time in handing her over to her mother.

After a moment, a slow smile spread over Hinata's face as she glanced down at her baby.  "Tsukiko," she repeated, testing the name on her tongue.  "I like that."

Endnotes: Hee, shortest labor ever.  So, I was making every bit of that birth scene up; let's practice our Suspension of Disbelief, shall we?  Also, Tsuki means 'moon', and –ko is a common ending for female names in Japanese.


End file.
